When I sat at my computer determining whether or not I really did want to write this post – I can’t speak for other ‘bloggers’ but for me personally sometimes there is some deliberation that takes place between the idea and the execution when it comes to blogging. And to be truthful today I really wasn’t sure I was up to writing this posts.

You see thoughts are mainly private and thus there is an apparent safety in them. I say ‘apparent’ because not all thoughts – certainly not mine at least – are safe or healthy. But in the main, they remain fairly harmless unless you either a) act upon them or b) in some cases, share them.

And smiles, when it comes to the latter of those two – the sharing of them – can be the same, can’t they?

In truth I could smile all day long in the solitude of my home and it would effect or (as the above image suggests) confuse no-one. (Other than my dog TJ perhaps. LOL)

But the minute I share that smile with someone else, it has all the potential – does it not – of having an impact on them. Unless of course they are so pre-occupied with other things (or other thoughts) that they really don’t notice. But then arguably the process of sharing of the smile is incomplete.

Smiles are all around us, aren’t they? I live in Ireland and you only have to walk down any street and pass folk and you are still sure to be greeted in one friendly fashion or another. (Something which I have noticed does sadly appear to be in the decline) And usually with a smile. But are those smiles real or are they often masks that people wear as a result of social etiquette or as a result of other people’s expectations?

Some smiles are – let’s say – simply natural, an involuntary or subconscious bi-product of how a person is feeling. Maybe long-term in existence or momentary and fleeting as a result of some thought or event which has just happened.

But other smiles, well they are more deliberate, more connived, more manufactured. Placed on the face of the wearer by the wearer as a result of deliberate thought and with a deliberate purpose in mind. To offer you the viewer what you want or (as is often the case) to dissuade you the viewer from seeking deeper knowledge or further information.

And there is very little wrong with offering others a smile when they expect it or want it. Is there? Or when you simply can’t face or bring yourself to explain or share the hurting or the depression that you are really feeling?

After all, not everyone cares or wants or even needs to know about the depression you are going through. Or the hurting you have inside. And indeed not everyone should know about it. Trust me on this, there are those out there who would do so much damage if they did know.

But what about your desperate need for some to know? Someone to understand? Someone to still accept you, even love you, despite that depression, those thoughts, that hurting?

And what about those who should know? Those who should be told, who should be there for you at such times. Those for whom the truth and your ‘freedom to be real’ should be more important than social norms or everything ‘appearing rosy in the garden of life’.

I cannot even begin the explain or describe the importance of having someone in your life with whom you can be real – especially if you do suffer from depression (in any of it’s forms). Some person, a friend or a loved one, a family member, who will not only offer you the freedom to be real but who also accepts you and yes who still loves you when you are real.

The problem is that sadly, unless you suffer from depression, in one of it’s various forms, it is so very hard to understand (and thus to fully relate to) what it is like. Which is why I believe that online communities such as the Mental Health Writers Guild and blogs such as this one are so important.

Because all too often even those who really do care and who do still try to understand and love you through the difficult times. Those times when despite your best efforts you cannot escape the impact of the (often altered) realities depression forces upon you. Can’t understand and feel so helpless. They stand – if you like – at the edge of a world in which they see you suffering and which they know they cannot truly enter in order to try to ease your suffering. No matter how much they may want or need to. Or at the edge of a world which you seem to have suddenly forced upon them and which they do not understand. Of course for the person – like me – who suffers the depression and who is involuntarily going through that latest episode it is not a case of forcing our world on others but of desperately trying to reach out from within it and be held, be accepted, be understood, be loved.

And so all too often we try to hide that world in which you cannot belong, should not belong. We try to protect you from the world we know we cannot protect ourselves from. And often we do so by hiding that world behind a smile. Behind a mask. After all, is not a smile far more acceptable than a sign which reads (as my mind [Mini Mental Me] often tells me I am) “Danger! – walking Minefield – Keep Clear!”.

For me personally – as a Christian who suffers from mental illness – I see the smile (and yes even the laughter) that I try to offer others, not as a lie or a mask to hide the pain or the depression within. But more as a way of my offering my Christ and the joy that He offers me despite my mental health issues.

But I do need and want to be very real and very honest here. Sometime my depression and my mental health smothers and impacts me so much that even my finding my Christ and my faith – which has brought me through this far – is so very hard. And so yes, sometimes my smile, my laughter and joking, is indeed a mask to hide that which I don’t think you either need or want to see. And I am certainly not alone in this and certainly not the only one who struggles and yet paints on ‘the smiling face of depression.’

Something which I feel most bloggers experience at one point or another, and certainly a read through other blogger’s blogs would seem to confirm this, is writer’s block.

So here I am, having not posted anything on this blog since April, sat in my study, coffee to one side and keyboard in front of me determined to reach out ‘beyond the block‘ which has been oppressing me of late.

“Oppressing me of late“. Now there’s an interesting way of putting it, isn’t it? Webster’s offers a number of different definitions of the word ‘oppression’, one of which being – “A sense of being weighed down in body or mind.” and certainly that definition would seem very apt for what I have been feeling of late. (Although I personally, as a Christian, would want to add to that definition, but more of that later.)

This blog (like so many of the blogs which I read) focusses on Mental Health and is a way of my sharing my experiences with my mental health in the hope of; a) understanding my mental health more and b) helping others to understand mental health more. Mental health which can, let’s be clear about this, present the sufferer with a whole plethora of different experiences and of different highs and lows.

So when a mental health writer (such as I) experiences what many writers would simply consider or label “Writer’s Block” it is important, I feel, to look beyond that ‘block’ and to consider both where that block came from and indeed, what it signifies or indicates.

You see, something which I personally have come to realise, and something which we all (in my opinion would be wise to consider when such blocks appear) is that it is possible that something has happened which has forced or lured us into a state of relative autopilot.

That state of life where we ‘exist’ more than ‘live’. Where we simply go from; task to task, chore to chore, obligation to obligation. routine to routine.

And please understand that I say this not with a sense of defeatism, but with a sense of awakening and of commitment and determination.

For me personally, a number of factors seem to have contributed to this oppression and therefore simply engaging my ‘autopilot’. My physical health is without doubt one of the largest factors, but also personal relationships and financial concerns seem to be contributory factors. And all of these seem to impact each other – at least in my own experience.

And truly I do understand the engaging of autopilot in an attempt to stop or at very least to slow down that crippling ‘free fall’ that so many of us have experienced.

But I am convinced that this is not the way that we are intended to live.

And I am also convinced that all it inevitably does – if we are not mindful of it and if we do not take measures to disengage it an to come out of it – is cripple and imprison us.

Doing so in such an often subtle and debilitating way, that the longer we are in this state the more damage is being done beyond our awareness and thus the harder it is to get out of it.

Which I think brings me back to that original definition of oppression which I mentioned and to the fact that I personally, as a Christian, would want to add to it.

You see, I am convinced that there is also a spiritual aspect to it all. That the definition should not only be, “A sense of being weighed down in body or mind.” but more completely be “”A sense of being weighed down in body or mind or spirit.”

For me personally, my faith is central to who I am and crucial to me. And even in this I seem to have been gone into ‘autopilot’ as the factors I mentioned above and also everyday pressures of life seem to have taken their toll.

But who says we have to ‘free fall’ in such situations? Who says we have to be crippled and imprisoned?

The past? The lies we have bought into and which were introduced way back when and which were then reinforced by our damaged and corrupted self-image and by a world which is as self-centred and uncaring as it seems intent to be?

What is to stop us soaring? What is to stop us climbing up on the very block which is designed to oppress us and keep us down and launching ourselves into a new more determined future?

So yes, I recognise ‘the block’ which has kept me down of late, but I refuse to take ownership of it or to simply exist within it. And I am determined to reach out and claim back my life beyond it and to rise above it all.

I have, over the years used many metaphors in order to try to describe or explain my mental illness and the way in which it impacts my life. Some have been dark and sinister by nature and some (I hope) humorous and light hearted.

For the uninitiated or unfamiliar with ‘Mini Mental Me’ he is the little man who lives in my brain and who is charged with the responsibility of ensuring it’s correct and efficient functioning. But who – for a myriad of reasons – constantly fails at this task – often to varying degrees of spectacular.

One reason his frequent inadequacy at the role which which he is charged is – or so it seems to me – appears to be his addiction to ‘Thought Jenga’.

‘Thought Jenga’ appears to be a game which he plays where he takes all my different thoughts and thought processes (represented above by the different coloured bricks) and instead of organising and stacking them neatly and correctly – as my OCD requires and as any normal mind would – decides to see just how much fun he can have by stacking them all higgledy-piggledy in order to (I can only assume) watch them (and of course my peace of mind and sometimes my life) wobble and shake and subsequently tumble. A past-time which is obviously a a spectator sport egged on by both the internal dialogue and those pesky destructive (seemingly) external voices.

[Of course it is entirely possible that I do not have mental illness at all and it is Mini Mental Me who has mental illness. But don’t tell my psychiatrist that as it would no doubt instantly be recorded on my file as me being delusional in some way LOL.]

So where does Mental Mini Me’s apparent addiction to ‘Thought Jenga’ leave me and what is the prognosis for it’s impact on my life.

Well I guess a lot of that – whilst part of it is of course outside of my control – is down to how I approach it, I think.

So what I have decided to try to do for the rest of this year – the beginning of year already being fairly spectacular in it’s madness and mayhem – is to try to take control of the things that are important and which I can take control of. And I am doing so in full awareness that they will at sometime go awry and will therefore need repairing.

But my thought process (hopefully this one isn’t flawed or foolish) is that the more control I take of things that can and often to wrong, and the more I maintain control of them the less damage that can be done and thus the less repairing required when things inevitably do mess up (Or should that be when I or Mental Mini Me inevitably messes up?)

And to do this I have been identifying weak spots, stressors and areas of need. These are the areas where the most damage is often done and which often cause a downward spiral in my physical or mental health. Of course living alone makes controlling – heck often even recognizing – these glitches all the more difficult.

But I have at least identified the key areas. Which are as follows…

Keeping my home neat, tidy, clean and orderly. My environment has, I have learned, a direct impact on my mental health and one sign that things are not good – either with my mental health or my physical health is a decline in the general good order of my home. And this in turn then adds to the problems. I am determined to try to keep my home a lot cleaner and tidier this year. Not that it is usually that bad but can get quite bad when my physical or mental health declines.

Eating Healthily and Regularly. I tend to forget to eat and I certainly don’t eat regularly or healthily enough. In truth I can not only go hours without even thinking about food, but even a couple of days without thinking about food. Additionally, other factors play into this. Financial difficulties, physical health, memory issues, focus issues, to name but a few.

For example, if I screw up my finances – something I tend to do a lot – I often don’t have enough to buy food, let alone healthy food And this can last for some time as often when I screw up my finances I am left desperately paying all my money to bills instead of buying essential food.

Likewise, if my physical health is bad, and (as regular readers will know) I have a number of physical health issues, I can find myself unable to stand long enough to cook a healthy meal and so resort to microwave meals, take outs or fast food deliveries. Something which I am determined to change this year.

Actively fighting the compulsion to isolate. Whilst isolation or at very least limited socialization appears on face value to be my most comfortable approach and certainly reduces the ammunition available to the negative internal dialogues and paranoid and destruction external voices, it is probably true that it is in the long wrong not healthy for me. So I am going to try to socialize more this year and at very least leave my house more. At the moment, apart from going out for a coffee and a little shopping twice a week with my carer Sinéad (something which only began last year) I tend only go out to church on Sundays, sometimes a bible study once a week, and if necessary essential doctor, hospital or psychiatrist visits (and even them I tend to avoid if possible). Although thanks to Sinéad’s encouraging and efforts I did get out much more last year.

Also being more active (when I am able) will no doubt help with my weight and health.

Having a regular and recognisable routine. This is another area which really helps with my mental health and indeed my physical health. The more I have a routine the better I am. And at times when my mental health starts to slip into a decline or a crash, having and keeping to a routine can delay or slow this decline or even prevent a crash.

Keeping my mind active and healthily focused. This is a big one for me, As often when my mental health suffers (and Mental Mini Me plays ‘Thought Jenga’ my focus, memory and comprehension suffer. Which means even the simplest of things like reading becomes difficult. (Sometimes I can’t even remember the start of the paragraph by the time I am two lines into it. And so writing is therefore even harder and often impossible. Posts which I would normally write fairly speedily can take me numerous hours to complete. And I get frustrated with the situation (and thus myself) and lose interest.

Additionally – as part of the ‘Thought Jenga’ games that Mental Mini Me plays, and the resultant increased internal and external dialogues, I can slip into harmful or unhealthy thought patterns and processes,

But I am convinced that the more I engage in healthy mental activity the less this will happen. At least that’s the theory. (Just as long as I watch for signs of compulsive thought patterns)

Taking my meds regularly. Is another huge one for me. But thank fully there are some improvements on this score. Because I struggle so much with my finances I often forgo buying my meds and pay off my bills instead. Additionally because of my frequent memory and focus issues I have often (actually frequently) forgotten my meds. And then of course there are the fairly common ‘do I really need these’ or ‘can I actually be bothered to take these’ syndromes when it comes to meds, which a lot of us seem to experience.

If I go for a while without remembering to take my meds and am not cognitive of any slipping in my mental or physical health (which of course are often there but I just haven’t seen the signs) I question if I really need them at all. Which of course I do.

And if I am totally honest. To add to all this I simply don’t trust and don’t like the effects of my psychiatric meds.

But, as I said, there have been huge improvements on this score. I am (thanks to the support and encouragement of a couple of dear friends – you know who you are) at least taking my physical health related meds pretty much as I am meant to. And so that is a good sign at least.

Managing my finances properly. Is perhaps the biggest of all of the weak spots, stressors and areas of need. There is a recognisable cycle here. My mental health (or even my physical health) declines and my memory, focus and comprehension decline along with it. I forget to pay bills and spend my money on other things or simply spend it on other people.

What happens next is that either a) I then get angry letters telling me I haven’t paid bills – which alert me to the fact that my mental health has slipped somewhere along the way and I haven’t noticed or b) my mental health improves and I myself realise that I have messed up again. And I then of course, go into a lengthy phase of trying to repair the damage already done.

And this long pattern of financial mismanagement has often taken its toll and often leaves me feeling like a failure and both demoralized and defeated. Which of course then only provides ammunition to those internal and external harmful and negative dialogues. Which then in turn complicate matter further and induce a further decline in my mental health.

And those, amongst a plethora of other stressors, weak spots and areas of need are (I think) the main ones. They can be so destructive, can’t they?

But I am convinced that there is hope – even with Mini Mental Me and his apparent ‘Thought Jenga’ addiction. Not only for me, but for all of us suffering with poor mental health or with mental illness. And yes even those of us who suffer from paranoid or non paranoid schizophrenia or (like me)with schizoaffective disorder.

The fact is that I have seen an improvement in almost every one of the key areas that I have mentioned above. But, of course, the biggest one – my finances – is a huge challenge and the one I seem to struggle with the most.

And of course if I could just cure Mini Mental Me’s Apparent Addiction to ‘Thought Jenga’ life would be soooooo much better.

According to Marjorie Taylor and her colleagues at the University of Oregon, by age seven, about 37% of children take imaginative play a step farther and create an invisible friend.

And my initial answer to that question (which obviously places me in the 63% majority) was very true and very accurate. And was that…

I really don’t think that I did. At least I can’t remember actually having any. I had two brothers and a sister and maybe felt that was enough.

But it is perhaps interesting to consider why I didn’t.

In the same article Psychology Today also states that…

It seems logical that children who invent invisible friends might be lonely or have social problems, but research doesn’t support those assumptions.

But it then also goes on to say that…

Oldest children, only children, and children who don’t watch much television are more likely to create an imaginary friend. This probably reflects opportunity. Children need unstructured time alone to be able to invent imaginary friends.

And certainly I was neither an oldest child, an only child or one who was limited in the amount of television that I watched. But there were also, I think, other factors in play here. Those factors being the thoughts and voices in my head and my relationship with my siblings.

The thoughts and voices in my head seemed to me to separate me and even in some ways isolate me from my siblings.

Although I do readily accept that this separation and isolation took more of the form of a perceived separation than anything else.

The fact is that in my own mind and in my own perception I was ‘different’, ‘not normal’, ‘weird’.

Basically I think that I really did feel as if I didn’t belong. And actually this is something that has remained with me all of my life.

Ad when I look at images, like the one to the left and notice how happy the boy with the imaginary friend seems to be, and hear stories and accounts of other children with imaginary friends, I do wonder why I didn’t have an imaginary friend.

I also wonder why the boy in the photo seems to have blue skin? Is he changing into a smurf? (But hey, that is just the way my mind works)

You see whilst some may think that loneliness might cause a child to invent an imaginary friend, I do understand the point made about above about “oldest children, only child, and children with limited television viewing being more likely to create an imaginary friend as a result of having more opportunity.” I also understand their point about, “children needing unstructured time alone to be able to invent imaginary friends.”

And whilst I would accept that having two brothers and a sister did mean that I had less time alone than say an only child, in truth I believe that I did have lots of “unstructured time alone” and certainly enough to invent an imaginary friend. Had I had the mind to. And likewise I certainly had the imagination and creativity necessary for this.

But here’s the deal. If you are a small child who is convinced that you are; ‘different’, ‘not normal’, and/or ‘weird’, and that you don’t belong. Why would you want to create an imaginary friend who is more than likely to have the same attitude towards you that others seem – at least in your mind – to have towards you. And why would you want to create an imaginary friend who would “not belong” along with you?

Additionally, having the voices and thoughts inside my head as a child meant that I often had enough difficulty determining actual shared reality with my own perceived reality.

So having additional imaginary friends would, I think, have seemed just a step too far.

And there is, at least I think, an interesting study here somewhere. Children having imaginary friends, according to the aforementioned article in Psychology Today, is “not evidence that a child is troubled.” And that in fact…

Surprisingly, invisible friends don’t necessarily disappear when childhood ends. One study that examined the diaries of adolescents plus questionnaire data concluded that socially competent and creative adolescents were most likely to create an imaginary friend and that this type of friend was not a substitute for relationships with real people.

So my questions would have to be, “Why then do these imaginary friends end in adulthood?” and, “why – since all the evidence suggests that actually, having imaginary friends in not harmful or a negative thing in and of itself – do we treat the idea with suspicion and caution when it comes to adults?”

As I mentioned before, I personally don’t have imaginary friends. I have had experiences in life where I have known someone and ‘imagined’ them to be my friend only to be proven wrong LOL. But hey, haven’t we all?

And as a writer, I have also known characters within my books and/or stories who seemed to have taken on; a life, a personality, a presence, of their own.

But then that is a different thing entirely.

I have also known people who – as some form of comfort or inspiration – out of their loss, continue to talk to their mother or father, gran or grandad, brother or sister, who has died. And I even know folk who do this with absolute conviction that this person really is there and really is looking over them and talking to them.

And I have to be honest here, I also know other Christians who have such a passion and such an intimate relationship with Christ or God that they communicate and envision Him in the same way.

(How’s that for opening up a whole hornets nest of comments from non-believers about God actually being an imaginary friend?)

But the thing is that I am just not that way inclined. And even though I am a Christian and absolutely do believe in the historical and biblical evidence of Christ and in the presence and sovereignty of God, and even though I have personally witnessed and do believe in the indwelling of the Holy Spirit within the believer. I have never had an approach or experience similar to the ones I have spoken about above.

And furthermore I am not prepared to judge those who do.

In truth I believe that we still have a very limited understanding of faith and still have a very limited understanding of the abilities and complexities of the mind. And I am still very much convinced that some of what is considered to be a sign of ‘mental illness’ is not a sign of mental illness at all, but rather a reflection and indication of our lack of understanding.

Do you like the title of this post? I hope you do or that, if nothing else, it has pricked your interest enough for you to read on. But I want to make it very clear from the ‘get go’ that it is not one of my lines or a statement of my own construction. (Although it could very well be.)

It is instead a line from a ‘button poem’ written by Sabrina Benaim and you can ( and I truly hope you will) view her reciting this poem in the YouTube video below.

I sat at my desk this morning just flicking through my Facebook page and came across a video about a homeless man who was given money to buy himself stuff but who then, instead of simply keeping it, used that money to buy food for others. (You have probably already see it as I believe it went viral and got a lot of media attention.)

Anyway, once that video had finished, I noticed another one which caught my eye – the Sabrina Benaim one entitled ‘Explaining My Depression To My Mother’ and I decided to click on and watch that.

I love all things ‘arty’ and write poetry myself and since the subject matter was mental health/mental illness it was of course of great interest to me. And I am so glad that I did watch it and I am delighted to be able to share it with you now.

Depression – the subject of the poem (and that which Sabrina was trying to explain to her mother) – hits those of us who experience it or duffer from it in different ways. And trust me, although I am a Christian with a very strong faith, I know only too well just what havoc it (and indeed other forms of mental illness) can reek in a person’s life.

I also know, first-hand, just how confusing it’s presence (in a believer’s life) can be to other Christians. And indeed the conversation which Sabrina has formed into her poem is not unique. And it is perhaps because of my faith that that one line – which I have used as the title of this blog – leapt out at me and resonated with me so clearly.

Of course, my mind – which all too often behaves like a four year old being set free and unsupervised in a candy store (sweet shop), running all over the place grabbing and unwrapping and devouring things – has already started to take me down a whole plethora of different thought processes and deliberations as a result of the poem and indeed as a result of that one line.

But that (exploring those thought processes and trying to bring my mind back into line) is something I will attend to once I have finished this post. But to give you some idea of said thought processes here are just a few of them:

“Can one baptise one’s self?” “Does such an ‘ocean of happiness’ even exist?” “Is faith meant to give us happiness?” “Is ‘happiness’ even the right word or is it ‘joy’ that we need?” “And indeed what are the differences?” “And hey, even with that ‘joy’ do we experience, are we meant to experience, oceans of happiness?” “Does anyone truly experience oceans of happiness?”

Of course all of those (and trust me there are many more) are linked to my faith and not the purpose or focus of Sabrina’s poem. But isn’t that how our minds work? Often taking things – the actions and statements of others and making them, shaping them, filtering and receiving them, in a way which is personal to us?

So I close this post (and wander off to my mental journey of deliberations and reflections) with the video of Sabrina reciting her poem (And I commend and thank Sabrina for her bravery in making and publishing it, or allowing it to be published) and I invite you to comment on what it said, how it spoke, to you…

I wonder what Christmas means or (given that it is now December 29th) what it was like for you?

For me personally Christmas is usually a time of conflict and duality.

Conflict and duality which comes from a) my heart-felt desire, as a Christian, to celebrate the Saviour’s birth (and yes I know it didn’t really happen at this time of year or on December 25th – but this is the time of year and the day when a lot of mankind chooses to celebrate it and I am ok with that) against b) the other side of me which is that I really am very uncomfortable around people. And Christmas is one of the times of year when there is a great expectation that we will spend time with others.

Normally I choose to, and can usually get away, with spending Christmas on my own and pretty much not (apart from church services and buying immediate family members presents etc) even really acknowledging it’s existence. (How’s that for earning extra Grinch or Scrooge points?)

And yes I am fully aware that some folk will be horrified at the idea that someone would actually want to spend Christmas alone pretty much ignoring it’s presence. But to you folk – who I am sure are good folk with legitimate concerns – all I can say is try to look beyond your own experiences and all the tinsel and baubles and try to imagine what it is like for those of us who suffer from mental illness and for whom social gatherings really are uncomfortable, even threatening. And try, if you will, to imagine just how much additional stress or pressure such a festive holiday full of expectations can place on us.

And the truth is that I am by no means against Christmas, nor indeed am I a Grinch or a Scrooge – although I admit I do do a very good impersonation of both.

Actually I love Christmas. I just recognise the fact that I just don’t do well with the additional pressure that often comes with it.

And this in itself poses us (those of us with mental illness and who do not do well in social situations) with a problem. Do we simply refuse to get involved and seek the familiar sanctuary of isolation? Or do we venture out of our comfort zone – our personal safety bubbles – and get involved as others seem so intent on having us do?

This year (unlike previous years) I relented and accepted the very kind invitation of Sinead – a friend from church and my carer – and went and stayed with her family for a few days over the Christmas period. And in fact I even agreed to accept her and her husband’s invitation to stay an extra night.

And in the interest of honesty and objectivity I have to admit that I really did have a lovely time and that none of it was ‘too much’ for me to handle. And I make that statement not only in testament to Sinead and Tony and their family and how loving and caring they are, but also as an encouragement to others (who may have similar difficulties as me) and to say that sometimes it can work and can very much be worth while.

That is not to say that there weren’t associated difficulties. All of which I accept came from within me and none of which being as a result of anything anyone else did or didn’t do, said or didn’t say.

I find that I am mentally exhausted at the moment. Quietly dealing with the voices and the internal dialogues whilst trying not to negatively impact anyone else’s Christmas can (I assure you) be very draining. During the day – with the activities and conversations and even the distraction available in the company of others – I found that I was very much able to cope. But at night time, when alone in my room – the mind had a field day and did what it could to sabotage it all.

And additionally, when I returned home, the very first thing I wanted to do was to keep everyone else out. And additionally I have an extreme need (or perhaps it is just an extreme desire) to completely isolate for a while. Something which I was aware of even before I came home, and so decided not to even attend church yesterday.

And yes I recognise that isolating it not a good thing and again I want to emphasise that none of this is as a result of anything anyone else did or said and that I do truly believe that it was worth it.

But that can be the nature of mental illness can’t it?

Even when we feel we have achieved some victory, some progress over it, it can come back at us with vengeance. Even trying to rob us of what achievements or victories we may have just had.

As I said, I am extremely grateful for the Christmas I was able to share this year and I really did enjoy it and have a lovely time. And I am convinced that it was totally worth it. And I would encourage others to think very hard about actually trying to reach out beyond the comfort zone.

But we need to do so being very mindful that there is no doubt a cost involved in this and that we (both those of us with mental illness and those who are caring for us, or encouraging us to go beyond our comfort zones) have to be very careful.

Comfort zones are not always a good thing. And I will even go as far as to recognise and acknowledge that sometimes they are a very unhealthy thing.

BUT, I do so in the strict understanding that I also know – from very real first-hand experience – that sometimes, just sometimes, our comfort zones are an absolute must if we are to survive.

I am extremely grateful for the opportunity and the encouragement to have stepped outside of mine this Christmas. But with the New Year festivities fast approaching, and the way I am at the moment, I am also very grateful that my comfort zone is still available to me 🙂

Whilst I think that this is a very interesting question I do also recognize that it is one which also comes (when answering) with some necessary caution.

The reason for this being, that in answering or detailing where your support does actually come from you are (by virtue of their absence from said answer) also indicating where you do not get your support from.

Now when starting this blog I made a very conscious, deliberate and (in my opinion) important decision. Which was that I would do my best, throughout all of the posts of this blog, not to consciously bring discomfort or distress to anyone through what I share nor to allow bitterness or revenge to enter into any of my posts.

This policy of trying to avoid causing people distress and of actively trying to avoid bitterness or the need for revenge is one which I also try to maintain throughout my life.

Therefore, I have decided to keep my answers ‘general’ by nature instead of mentioning any specific persons by name. There are of course a few people in my life who have been spectacular in the support that they have given me and/or do give me and whilst you are most certainly noteworthy, I am sure that you already know just how appreciated you are and will appreciate my reasons for not mentioning you by name.

So, the above having been said, here are the ‘general’ sources of the (extremely appreciated) support which I do receive…

My Carer….

In terms of support, I would have to say that most of it – in day to day terms – comes from my Carer. Regular readers will be aware that additional to my poor mental health I suffer from a very poor physical health also.

This, along with my mental health, has led to the need for me to have a carer and my carer – you know who you are 🙂 – is such a blessing to me and I would hate to think just what I would be like without her support.

Members of my family…

I am very much aware that for some, reactions to the presence of their poor mental health or their mental illnesses has caused great difficulties within their families and that tragically in some situations it has caused them to be shunned or to feel that they are better off living their lives without their family.

In my own situation the fact is that I have little to no doubt that as a child and youth and young adult my mental illnesses seriously impacted my relationships with my family. But that was then and this is now. Now I am 52 years old and in fact live alone. I also live in a different country to the one in which I grew up and in which all of my birth family still live. Because of this, the chances or opportunities for my birth family to support me are fairly limited or indeed are non-existent.

And when it comes to my immediate family, here again only one of my children lives here in Ireland and anywhere close to me. That having been said, despite their all having their own families to look after, I have to say that I do get a great deal of support from them when they are aware that I need it.

Members of my church….

I attend an extremely loving and caring church and there are certain members within the church (and it’s leadership team) who have been and are such a blessing and such a support to me.

Likewise, I also attend a small bible study group within that church. Here, all of the members of that group are, by virtue of the fact that it is a much smaller and thus more personal and intimate a group, aware of my mental illnesses and more aware of some of the struggles that I face as a result of them. And I have to say that they are all so very supportive.

Other bloggers and writers….

One area of support which cannot or should not go unmentioned is the mental health community here online. By this I mean those fellow bloggers and writers who give of themselves regularly to share what is happening in their own lives and with their own mental health and to – by doing so – say, “you are not alone” or “yes, that happened/happens to me.”

They share information, encouragements, heartaches and inspirations in their writings and often read and comment of each others blogs and provide essential support through all this. They are such a blessing and support to me and, whilst I might not always be very good at saying thank you or remembering to comment back, are all appreciated so very much.

My Neighbors….

Whilst I have to be honest and say that very few (if any) of my neighbors would have any real knowledge of the fact that I have mental illnesses, they all do know that I experience poor physical health.

I think it would, in fact, be fair to say that my physical health issues are (generally speaking) more prominent than my mental health issues. I am so very thankful that all of my neighbors are polite and friendly towards me and that some of them are also so very supportive when I need it.

My faith…

The truth is that I simply could not complete a list of where I get my support without mentioning my faith. I cannot, for the life of me, begin to think just where I would be, or what would have happened to me by now had I not been blessed with such a strong faith.

And I think that also raises another important point about support.

My faith affords me so much strength and so much hope in the most darkest of times. And unlike a great deal of support which comes from outside ourselves, my faith affords me a strength and a support which comes from within.

In truth, I do not know the faiths of a great many of the folk who write blogs on their mental illness or mental health. But I do see such strength in so many of them.

And I think that the support that we gain from inner strength is often so much more powerful than that offered from others outside of ourselves, and often goes so unnoticed.

Day 17: If you could get rid of your mental illness(es) would you? Why or why not?

I have considered this question on numerous occasions. I think many of us haven’t we?

And indeed I am sure that I have written about it before as well. And I realize that at this point I really should place a link to that previous post on this subject. But actually, I have decided – just out of purely personal curiosity – not to read that previous answer before I answer it this time.

I just thin k it would be interesting (well to me at least) to see if my answer now differs from the answer that I gave then in any way. But I promise I will search for that previous answer and post a link to it at the end of this post.

If I could get rid of my mental illnesses, would I?

In truth so very much of me wants to shout YES! Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes! The reality is that having recently gone through a particularly bad episode with my mental health, I came out of it only to find that a day or so later my mental health started declining again and that I was entering into yet another episode.

I don’t know about you, but that happens with me sometimes. It seems to all be linked to the level of damage done during that bad episode. If I come out of it and very little damage was done during that episode then I can cope and recovery starts. But if I come out of it and a lot of damage was done then I (or rather my mental health) simply goes back down hill again. And that can be so very tiring and so very demoralizing. So yes, so very much of me wants to shout yes! I would get rid of my mental illnesses.

And yet there is another part of me which shouts no! No I wouldn’t. And the really weird thing is that this is the larger part when it comes to this question.

That having been said I think in some ways how I view my mental illnesses is like how I viewed hitchhiking. (And yes I did my fair share of hitchhiking when I was younger.) And when I did do it I had a love hate relationship with it. Whilst it was sunny and warm or I was sat in someone’s nice car or the cab of their lorry, chatting away and being totally free to go wherever I pleased, I simply loved it. But when it was cold and wet and the rain was pouring down and I was stuck on the side of the road or motorway slip-road I absolutely hated it.

Yes, in some ways I view my mental health in the same way. When my mental health is reasonably good – when I am going through better episodes – I can see some benefits from it. But when I am going through bad episodes or have just come out of bad episodes I hate it.

But there is another reason why I would have to say no, I wouldn’t get rid of my mental illnesses and that reason is linked to my faith.

Why I would not get rid of my mental illnesses.

Those of you who know me well, or are regular readers will know that I am a Christian. And whilst I try very hard not to bang on about my faith, and to keep this blog specifically focused on Mental Health issues. My faith is a very real part of me and is core to who I am. It is therefore impossible for me to answer this question without mentioning my faith.

An essential part of that faith is to trust in Christ in all things. I have given my life to Christ and I do my best to do that – to trust in Him. Yes I sometimes fail. But, wherever possible, I do try to trust in Him in all things. Including in my Mental Illnesses and with my Mental Health.

And that can be so very difficult at times, can’t it? Especially (for me personally) when my mental illnesses seem to take over and my mental health deteriorates.

Not only because of the trials that I (and many others like me) face during these times. But because the very illness itself often leads to an inability to focus well enough to pray. Or well enough to read my bible. Or even well enough to benefit from listening to my much loved praise and worship music.

Additionally, and so very importantly, because part of my mental illnesses is depression and that depression itself seems to creep up on me, and envelope me and to rob me of any and all sense of hope.

But He, and those who love me – including my brothers and sisters in Christ – has brought me through my mental illnesses this far and I trust that He will continue to do so.

Have I prayed over my mental illnesses, or received prayers from others over it? Yes, most certainly. And in those prayers I have always sought God’s will for my mental health. And that is the key phrase here. Seeking God’s will.

If God is to be sovereign in my life, then He must be sovereign over my wellness and also over my sicknesses. If it is His will to remove my mental illnesses then, trust me, I would be delighted. But if, for some reason, He chooses not to remove my mental illnesses then I have to yield to that decision and to trust Him in that.

Now I know, first hand and as a result of countless conversations, that some Christian believe that we only have to ask God for healing and that He will alwaysimmediately heal us. Personally I do not subscribe to that belief and personally I believe such a believe to be un-scriptural. Do I believe God gives healing – absolutely I do. But do I believe it is always instant – absolutely not. And again, I have written on this before as well.

And in that post I remember sharing a video which I found to be very inspirational and so I am going to share that again here.

If I could get rid of my mental illness(es) would I?

In truth, I leave that question very much up to my God.

Of course I would be glad to lose all the negatives and trials resultant from it. I am only human after all. But there are positives in my life which, as far as I know, could be directly linked to my mental illnesses and I would not want to lose them. And additionally I have to be aware that God may have a purpose in all this – I just don’t know for sure.

But I do know one thing for sure… If, it is God’s will not to remove my mental illnesses this side of heaven, then I would rather experience a lifetime of mental illness and remain within the will God then spend one minute free from mental illnesses and be outside of His will.

(Oh yes, I promised to post a link to my previous answer to this question, didn’t I? You can find that post here.)

Day 16: How many people are you “out” to with your mental illness(es)? Why?

Being ‘out’ about my metal illnesses…

The short and simple answer to today’s question is, for me, that I am ‘out’ with my mental illnesses to most people.

That is not to say that everyone who knows me knows that I suffer from mental illness or poor mental health. But it is – I think – true to say that most of them do.

As for why this is the case, well that comes from a number of different reasons…

Why am I ‘out’ about my mental illnesses?

Firstly, having spent the majority of my life hiding or trying to conceal my mental illnesses I reached a point in my life (in 1999 when I suffered a complete mental and physical breakdown) where I could hide them no longer.

And so, as a result of this, my family and associates became very much aware of my mental health issues.

And whilst this was a particularly difficult time for both myself and my family, it was (once I had started my recovery) both a huge relief and a huge release and did also mean that I could finally get some proper help with it.

No more could I hide my mental illnesses from my family and associates and no more could I hide it in my professional life or ministry. In fact, as a result of those breakdowns, I was no longer able to work and was medically retired and placed on long-term disability.

Which brings me to the second reason why I am ‘out’ concerning my mental illnesses to most people…

Secondly, having spent so much time and effort trying to hide my mental illnesses (and/or trying to explain away or limit any damage done as a result of it) and now being finally free of this burden, I simply didn’t want to go back there.

The truth is that I could finally get the help that I needed and I knew – if I was going to have any chance of repairing some of the damage done to my family as a result of my mental illnesses – and indeed limit the potential for further damage I needed to face what had been and was going on with me and to get the help I had desperately needed for so long.

And finally, or thirdly, another reason why I am out to ‘most’ people concerning my mental illnesses is in fact this and other mental health related blogs which I write.

In my attempt to recover from my breakdowns (1999) I started writing out what I was going through or had gone through. It was a way of my trying to make sense of it all. My way of processing it all. Something else which I had, I thought out of necessity, often avoided in the past.

From this – and knowing the isolation that I had always experienced in my mental illness and realizing just how damaging that had been – I wanted to share what I had experienced and to somehow let others know that they are not alone and indeed didn’t have to be alone.

So I started this blog (and then other blogs). But when I started this blog I was faced with a choice and a very real decision to make. Did I write anonymously, as other bloggers who write about their mental illness seem to do? Or do I write openly under my own name?

And that is a decision many bloggers have to make.

Trust me, having hidden my mental illnesses for so long I truly understood the necessity for some bloggers to write anonymously. But since my breakdowns (when everything came to light in a very real and unavoidable way) and since I was no longer working and thus had very few reasons to hide my mental illnesses any more, there was no longer a need for a mask of anonymity. My mask had very clearly been removed.

And whilst this very much left me feeling (in many ways) both naked and vulnerable. It did also bring with it a great deal of freedom.

So yes, I am ‘out’ about my mental illnesses to most people. This blog is a matter of public record and is in the public domain and is linked to, and often contains, not only to my real name but also my real face.

Additionally it is linked to both my twitter account and to my Facebook account. So that whenever I post on here it appears on both of those also. And in this way, there is no longer any hiding.

The results of being ‘out’ about my mental illnesses…

In truth, (and from what I can tell from comments family and others have made) those who want to know more about my mental illnesses or my mental health read my blog posts and some ask me about them or comment on them. Doing so either on here, on Facebook, in email, or by private messages or in person.

I actively encourage these questions and comments as in the dialogue that follows not only do I feel that I learn and benefit but that others also seem to learn and benefit. And those comments and questions also often challenge my perspectives.

And here, I think I would like to close by including one last topic into the mix.

The challenges of being ‘out’ about my mental health…

But being ‘out’ about my mental health isn’t always a bed of roses and it does indeed have it’s associated challenges. Mental Illness and indeed Mental Health is still not fully understood or fully accepted by everyone.

In truth, it still carries with it a great deal of misconceptions, misunderstandings and even stigma. Mental Illness unsettles some people. Challenges other people. Confuses a lot of people and threatens yet other people.

One example of this, which is directly applicable to my own experience, is in respect of the church and the Christian community.

I am a Christian and have been a Christian for a good many years. I am a member of an extremely loving and compassionate and caring and Christ-centered church. And trust me, I am so blessed to be a part of them.

But even in this loving, compassionate, caring and Christ-centered community of believers I still meet folk for whom my mental illnesses bring confusion. Folk who are unsettled by my being a Christian with mental illnesses. Folk for whom the presence of my mental illnesses seems to threaten their understanding of faith.

And trust me, as sad as I find it to be, I do – at least in part – understand this. And it is one of the reasons why I ‘out’ and why I actively encourage; objective, loving and sensitive discussion and dialogue concerning my mental illnesses.

When asked about my faith and my mental illnesses here is the reply I often give…

My mental illnesses do not limit either my faith or my Christ, only (at times) my ability to enjoy or fully experience my faith and my Christ. But here’s another equally important question for you. Does your attitude towards my mental illnesses limit your faith and your experience of Christ?

If you want to know more about my mental illnesses and/or my faith all you have to do is ask. I would love for you to do so.

Sometimes, or so it seems to me, I have difficulties getting what is on the inside out to the outside.

Now, having just typed that statement, I freely accept that there are some – who know me beyond just words on a screen – who would be hard-pressed to believe I could ever struggle to get what is on the inside out into the outside.

In other words I accept freely that I am perhaps not always known for my diplomacy and tact 🙂

But what you see isn’t always what is truly happening now is it?

Indeed, for those of us who struggle with self-harming, one of the statements you will often hear in response to the question “why?” will be based around the need to actually “feel” something or “see” something tangible. To somehow “feel” or “see” what is “trapped inside” actually coming out in one way or another.

And trust me that is a very negative web and thought process. It really is short-term gain leading to long-term pain.

But for some of us who suffer with mental health issues that whole process of getting what is inside to come out to the outside can be a virtual minefield.

Firstly there is the whole issue of trust (or lack thereof) that is going on inside of us sometimes.

Do we really trust what we perceive to be happening?

Can we really trust our own thoughts?

And even if we do trust them, can we really trust the person we are speaking with to actually understand them let alone respect them?

And trust me the severity or level of impact of such questions can vary according to what state our mind – or even our lives – are in at any given time. Folk who, like me, struggle with voices and negative (often-times harmful) internal dialogues and who are therefore subject to stressful or difficult ‘episodes’ are far less likely to trust when in or when having just come out of such an episode than we are when things have been fairly good – And this is totally understandable isn’t it?

The difficulty is however, the more you experience such episodes the more they (and the resultant lack of trust) become the ‘norm’ and so that lack of trust can grow like a cancer in your life.

I found this wonderful illustration by an artist called “jollyself” over on the templates.com blog .

For me it so encapsulates the passion and yet the tragedy that is the disconnect that I am talking about between the inside and the outside for some of those of us who suffer with mental health issues.

In it I see both that disconnect and indeed the artificial, unreal, nature of how we perceive our own thoughts our own perceptions to be sometimes.

Over the past few days I have been struggling with these. Struggling to keep my mind focused. Fighting to keep a grasp on the real and to not give way to those harmful, negative, self-sabotaging thoughts.

So why am I writing this post?

Is it because I am feeling defeated? Not not at all!

I recognize the struggle (and in many ways the need to express and even explain – especially to those who love me and who will read this post – just where I am right now.

But I am certainly not yet at the point of feeling defeated.

Nor, just for the record, am I at a point of mania. Heck I am far to tired and physically weak to enter into a manic episodes right now.

No, I am writing this post right now because not only do I need to explain – to those who love me and who will be reading this post – just where I am at the moment but more importantly to try to offer some hope to others who may be going through such thoughts and feelings.

You see I know this ‘disconnect’ so very well. I know it’s methods, its nature and it’s potential outcome. But what is more I know it’s lies, it’s falsehoods and its trickery. And what is more I know that it can be defeated!

The truth is that this disconnect, this break between the inside and the outside is not real.

It is a corrupted perception as a result of the thought processes my mind is throwing up at the moment. And when that happens we need to cling on to the real. To remove our focus from the unstable and focus on the stable.

As a mental health sufferer finding that stability can be so very difficult can’t it?

But I am a Christian and as a Christian mental health sufferer I know something which, someone who will always remain stable. And that is the Lord. And it is on the Lord that I build my confidence and my strength.

So if you, like me, are struggling at the moment – I encourage you to hold on – there is hope. And I encourage you to pray. God is bigger than our mental health and His love – through Christ His son – is so very real. And nothing, not even our mental health issues – if we truly call to Him – can separate us from that love.

Perhaps one of the well known accounts in the bible is that of the woman who touched the hem of Christ’s robe and was healed.

It can be found in Mark 5:25-34 and also in Matthew 9:20-22 and Luke 8:40 – 48 and it tells the story of a woman who touched the hem of Christ’s garment and who was healed as a result of doing so and more importantly as a result of her faith.

It’s a wonderful account and one that I can relate to on so many levels. The woman had been suffering for years. She had faith that Christ had the power, authority and ability to choose to heal her. She reached out to Him.

As I said I can relate to her on so many levels. I too have been ill for years. I too have faith that Christ has the power, authority and ability to choose to heal me. I too have reached out to Him.

But of course there is one important difference (other than the fact that I am a guy). And that difference begs the question “What if?”

What if instead of healing her, Christ had reached down and lifted her into His arms and carried her home and tended to her? What if He; comforted her, encouraged and supported her? What if He had some purpose in not healing her right there and then? Would He be any less the Christ? Any less the Son of God? Any less God Himself?

If God is indeed sovereign with the power, authority and ability to choose to heal me, does He not also have the same power, authority and ability to choose not to heal me, or to do so at a time and place more fitting to His purpose for my life?

See I fully believe Christ can heal and that one day He will heal me but I recognize ad acknowledge the truth of my life and the examples in the bible where healing hasn’t been instant and I yield to His sovereign will for my life in health and in sickness as well.

And what is more I recognize, acknowledge and give thanks for the times when He has reached down and lifted me into His arms and carried me home and tended to me! When He; comforted me, encouraged me and supported me through the really difficult times of my illnesses both physical and mental!

What if Christ has some purpose in not healing me right there and then? Would He be any less the Christ? Any less the Son of God? Any less God Himself?

Regular readers of this blog will know that I am both a Christian and someone who struggles with suicidal thoughts as part of my mental health.

This perhaps place me in a position which is fairly different to a lot of folk as it places me in a position where conversations about suicide and faith are fairly common place.

And I have to tell you that my own personal experience is that very often the albeit well meaning responses of Christians, just as with many other folk, concerning suicide can be both so very unhealthy and so very unhelpful for those of us who do struggle with suicidal thoughts.

Now before continuing, let me just make this statement of fact. I currently attend a church here in Ireland where their approach to the whole subject of suicide is generally extremely good and extremely; loving, understanding, informed and helpful. But sadly this can be the exception to the rule.

So let’s look at the facts… (The following bullet-pointed facts were supplied by the IASP working in official relations with the World Health Organization.)

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Suicide is one of the leading causes of death in the world, especially among young people.

Nearly one million people worldwide die by suicide each year.This corresponds to one death by suicide every 40 seconds.

(This staggering figure makes it one of the most important issues facing mankind today…)

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The number of lives lost each year through suicide exceeds the number of deaths due to homicide and war combined.

(Either as individuals or indeed as members of churches and faith based groups, we cannot afford to turn a blind eye or be misinformed concerning this issue.)
———————————————————-oOo——————————————————–

These staggering figures do not include nonfatal suicide attempts which occur much more frequently than deaths by suicide.

A large proportion of people who die by suicide suffer from mental illness.

(Not everyone who suffers from mental illness will contemplate suicide just as not everyone who contemplates suicide will have suffered from mental illness.)

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Recent estimates suggest that the disease burden caused by mental illnesses will account for 25% of the total disease burden in the world in the next two decades, making it the most important category of ill-health (more important than cancer or heart diseases.)

(Any church or faith based organization wishing to minister love, support and hope in this world must therefore be aware of this issue.)
———————————————————-oOo——————————————————–

A significant number of those with mental illnesses who die by suicide do not contact health or social services near the time of their death. In many instances, there are insufficient services available to assist those in need at times of crisis.

(Which again makes it a fundamental issue for churches and faith based organizations and this in turn makes it essential that churches and faith based organizations are both aware of the issue and indeed develop proper and healthy approaches to this issue.)

———————————————————-oOo——————————————————–
The facts are staggering aren’t they? Add to these the stigma that is all too often attached to those who suffer from mental illness or suicidal thoughts and trust me you seemingly get a very bleak picture indeed.

But there is hope! I truly believe that and I truly believe that the church has a very definite place in providing that hope.

As individual Christians and as Christian churches, I believe that, we have a very definite place in fighting both the stigma attached to mental illness and those who suffer from suicidal thoughts and to offering that hope that I speak of.

Not by offering cliches or well-worn snippets of scripture, and definitely not by offering judgmental or condemnatory remarks. But but offering love, understanding, support and encouragement to fight for the right to live and to live a life worth living.

As I said towards the beginning of this piece, I am a Christian and I am also someone who suffers from mental illness and suicidal thoughts as part of that mental illness. In truth my first suicide attempt was before I had even reached teenage years. My faith in Christ, which whilst I fully believe can for some provide total healing from both mental illness and suicidal thoughts, has not, thus far, removed them for me. BUT, and there is really no getting away from this, I am now some 51 years old and still here and still believing in Christ and still so very thankful that He has by the grace of God brought me through thus far.

Can Christ heal us – even from mental illness and suicidal ideology? Absolutely I believe He can! Is it guaranteed this side of heaven? No I do not believe that it is. And for me to say otherwise would be to lie to you and to God and I will not do that. My faith has not excluded me from mental illness or suicidal thoughts. BUT it, along with the love and support of my fellow believers, has brought me through both of them so far. And I praise and thank God for that.

Is there a place for the mentally ill and those who suffer with suicidal thoughts within the life of the modern church? Absolutely there is! But here is a better question for you – is there a place for the church within the lives of the mentally ill and those who suffer from suicidal thoughts?

Again I say there is and again I say that that place will only ever be truly secured, prayerfully, honestly and lovingly!

Like most folk who suffer from poor mental health I do my best to keep control of my mental health and how it effects both myself and indirectly therefore others. And for the best part I think I actually manage this quite well.

Of course I could always be deluding myself and since that is one of the symptoms of my condition I have to be open to the possibility that I am. But hopefully, and I really don’t think that it is, that is not the case.

I think a lot of us try to control our mental health and additionally a lot of us find some situations harder to deal with than others in this respect

For me personally one of the hardest situations to handle, and I doubt I am alone in this, is where the situation outside my head is so similar as to almost mirror or echo the situation inside my head.

Does anyone else struggle with this?

It is like I know that the situation inside my head is not real or is negative and unhealthy and I can cope with that. But when the situation outside my head mirrors that inside my head it gives the situation inside my head life, substance, credibility somehow. And that requires a whole different level of coping.

Of course folk seldom, if ever, know of what is going on inside your head and so how can they avoid sometimes mirroring or echoing it? So in the calm, in the rational, I tend not to blame folk when this happens. But there is that time immediately before the calm, before the rational. That point of explosion. That point where the realization that outside and in are both the same and that can be so very scary.

I personally believe that is why it is so important for us to be open and honest with those around us the most. To share with them just some of what is going on inside our heads.

To be candid about way different situations and circumstances make us feel.

And yet the requires us to open up doesn’t it? And opening up can feel like superman advertizing how he is vulnerable to kryptonite. It means allowing others to know, at least in part, our weaknesses.

But then isn’t that part of love? Trusting those who love you not to use that weakness against you?

As a parent I want to trust and to open up to those who are closest to me. As a Christian I want the same for my brothers and sisters in Christ. The words of 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 spring so readily to mind here.

“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”

“It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.”

I need to trust more and to share more. I need to hope more that others won’t use my own personal kryptonite against me. And I need to persevere when this occasionally happens 🙂 After all, we are all flawed in one way or another aren’t we? We all make mistakes don’t we?

So that is my challenge to myself today. To, within reason, be more open with those who love me about what is going on inside my head and to try to love more of the 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 love.

I saw this beautiful and yet sad picture over on FootSoldiers4Christ and it really impacted me!

I wonder what you see when you look at this picture?

A beautiful butterfly struggling with a rock?

A rock limiting a beautiful butterfly?

Is it a half glass empty v glass half full kind of question. Incidentally my normal answer to the question, “what do you say when you see a glass containing only half the amount of liquid it can contain – a) glass half empty or b) glass half full?” Is c) “Ok. which one of you scamps pinched half my drink?”

Actually the name of the above picture is “What is dragging you down?” Which I think kind of answers my question – at least in terms of what the person naming the picture thought.

So I ask that question next – what is dragging you down?

I have had a really wonderful day today. My son and his partner helped me with a big job that needed doing today and I am so grateful to them for doing so. But all through the day – despite the fact that our efforts were proceeding well and any obstacle encountered was moved or a way found around it (thank you Lord) – I have personally struggled.

Mentally I struggled with the voices and the negative internal dialogues. Physically I struggled with my health, the heat, my leg, and indeed my weight. These things were dragging me down, although I did what I could to hide it.

I also, along with much prayer, did what I could to fight through them and by the grace of God was able to.

So that is what I see when I see this picture. Neither a beautiful butterfly struggling with a rock nor a rock limiting a beautiful butterfly.

NO what I see is a beautiful butterfly taking flight despite the thing that tries to hinder it.

And that is my encouragement for each and every one of my readers today. “Yes we all have things which seem to drag us down or seek to limit us. But we don’t have to give in to them.“

I am blessed, extremely blessed to have a strong faith and a personal relationship with Christ. Through that and through the loving support of my brothers and sisters in Christ – especially at the church I attend (Wxccc) I gain; strength, encouragement, support and determination to go on.

So, as I make ready to turn in for the night, I leave you with that encouragement and with this adaptation of that wonderful picture…

OK so my leg isn’t really pregnant and yes I am fully aware of this. But I went, at my therapist’s request, to see my doctor yesterday and he advised me that I needed an ultrasound. And what is the first thing you think of when you hear the word “ultrasound” – yep pregnancy. Hence the weird thought pattern. But hey, sometimes you just have to see the funny side of things. 🙂

In essence the situation is that my leg needs therapy but the level of therapy that I can receive is dictated by my heart conditions.

So the position is that I have to get an ultrasound on my leg in order to dictate exactly what level of compression – which is all part of the treatment – I am safely allowed to have. And as the Doc advised me yesterday the ultrasound will also confirm the diagnosis of lymphedema and that it isn’t more cardiac related.

In the mean time – whilst I wait for the the ultrasound appointment to come through – he (my doctor) will be contacting the therapist and I should be able to at least start some sort of therapy.

So there is good news and not so good news on the whole leg issue. I have to be honest and admit that patience is not one of the things that I am abundantly gifted with, nor am I very good and sitting still and keeping the leg elevated as ordered. Although I am trying to be good in this respect.

It seriously cuts into the amount of time I can spend at the computer and this in turn really eats into the amount of time I can blog or write. And whilst laptops are fine, I just can’t seem to perch the laptop in such a position where I can write comfortably and have already tripped over the power cable on two previous attempts. So in the interest of health and safety I tend to avoid the whole laptop on the lap idea.

Of course when you experience poor mental health, and especially a schizophrenic condition, the voices and internal dialogues seem to latch onto such things and twist and magnify them in your mind – presenting a cocktail of all sorts of potential negative outcomes and accusatory jeers as to how you brought all this on yourself as a result of your weight.

Which of course there is some truth to. But then that is part of their trickery is it not? Using some basic truths (so that they have some credibility and are difficult to fully discount or refute) and then twisting and corrupting them beyond reason or rational thought.

It is often hard, for folk who do not have voices, to understand the full impact of them on the life of those who do. And I understand this, so in my blogs I try to demonstrate some of how these can impact us.

Actually, I am convinced that we all have internal dialogues and that for some of us, those internal dialogues can be such a negative thing. So imagine what they would be like if they were both a) constant and b) had an audible voice. Add to that the often grandiose almost delusional thoughts and frequently harmful thoughts an suggestions that they offer and perhaps you will get a better understanding of what it can be like.

Thankfully however, I am blessed with both a strong faith and an extremely logical mind. So I can at least (but no not always) reason things out to some extent.

But my heart goes out to those who suffer far worse than I do with such voices and thoughts. And my heart also goes out to the families and friends of those who suffer with schizophrenic conditions. I know from my own relationships just how frustrating our condition can be for those who love us.

But I am convinced that there is hope and that has to be there core message of my post this morning.

Whist it is, to some extent, true that our loved ones cannot directly penetrate those negative and harmful voices. They can influence them and they can impact them with; real, tangible, sensitive and constructive love.

I recognize the harmful and detrimental impacts and influences of both my voices and my internal dialogues and I praise God that I have both my faith and my logic in my armory and defenses.

But even more than this I thank the Lord for the wonderful family and church family that He has placed in my life and for the fact that God’s love knows no bounds. Not even my mental illness.

Well it has been a while since my last post and, as I was reminded, is probably way past time I posted an update 🙂

I have, as many of you will no doubt know, been having some serious issues with my leg and have been trying to get treatment for it and in the meantime have been ordered to keep it elevated as much as possible. Additionally the heatwave that we have been experiencing has only served to complicate matters – although I am delighted for all those who, unlike me, actually enjoy the heat 🙂

But having to keep my leg elevated has seriously impacted how much time I have been able to spend at my desk and at the computer and is partly responsible for my lack of posting recently.

The other reason for my lack of posting has been that what time I have been able to spend at the computer has been dedicated to getting some of my books edited and published.

I have been so touched, encouraged and in many ways humbled by the positive feedback that these are receiving and this has inspired me to wanting to get the series finished and out there so to speak. And I now have 9 books in the series out there on Amazon in paperback and kindle format – which is so encouraging, and I am now currently working on the 10th book whenever I am able. 🙂

In respect of my leg – or as I recently found out – my legs, since it seems that the other leg is also affected but to a much lesser and hardly noticeable level, I am still – despite my best efforts – awaiting news about when the treatment will start. Although I do have an appointment at the Foot Health Center on Friday which is at least something positive.

Mentally I find that my mind has been fairly tormented of late and that I am zoning in and out of depressive states more frequently. BUT the blessings are still there and thankfully, although tough to handle, these episodes have not been too lengthy. I never ceased to be amazed at how much God and my faith have brought me through and whilst the battle continues I know that I do not fight alone.

So there you have it, my update. I cannot say that things have not been tough as they have been. But what is more important is the fact that despite this I am still able to achieve things and that I know I am not alone in it all.

So my encouragement to you all, “No mater how hard it gets, keep on keeping on!”

Since it seems that I am unable to sleep tonight, although yes I am going to try again after I have posted this post, I thought that I would take a moment to post a quick update on what is happening with my leg as well a making an apology to all those who have posted such kind comments of late.

Firstly an apology – which of course is for my not having answered any of your comments of late. This was unavoidable really as I will explain whilst also giving my update.

I did manage to go to my appointment last Friday and indeed got a very positive prognosis providing of course that I do my bit.

I have to keep using the cream that I have been using to treat the skin and there were marked signs of improvement – which of course was encouraging as this was the biggest threat to the leg as it meant that the lymphatic fluids were either near to or beginning to leak through the skin.

I have been so very blessed by all the prayers and support in respect of this and am delighted to be able to say that when my son and his partner checked the leg for me this morning both he and she commented on how very much better it looked.

In respect of the swelling itself and the possible treatment that I can get for this I am still waiting to hear just what treatment I am able to receive. As many of you know I have a heart condition and some treatments are contraindicated for someone with a heart condition and even if I am able to have the treatment that is being considered the level of treatment is dependent on my doctor and so that is what is being decided at the moment.

Hopefully I will hear about this in the next few days. Additional to all this but still part of it, because I am also diabetic and because I am diabetic I also have to see a chiropodist and the earliest appointment that I am able to get for this locally is not until the end of the month and so we are trying to see if we can arrange an appointment slightly further afield and members of my church have kindly agreed to try to provide transport for this.

In the mean time – in order to safeguard the leg and address the swelling I am wearing a compression bandage and having to keep my leg elevate as much as possible – this has meant that the time I am able to spend at my desk on the computer is extremely limited and this is the reason for the lack of posts and indeed the lack of responses to your very kind comments.

One slightly surprising piece of news from my appointment is that whereas I thought that only one leg was affected it seems that there are early signs that the other leg is also becoming affected.

This is of course concerning but not too concerning as I am confident that once everything is sorted in respect of my heart condition and its implications on the type and level of treatment I can have, this will also be addressed.

In the mean time I am doing my bit by keeping my leg elevated as much as possible, using the creams regularly and wearing the compression bandages. I am also extremely blessed as my church have very kindly contributed to the cost of the treatment that I will have to have over the forth coming weeks.

So there you have it both my sincere apologies for not having posted or responded to your kind comments and indeed an update on how much more positive things seem.

I also want very much to thank everyone for their kind prayers. I have said many times over that without my faith I would be dead by now and I make that statement in all honesty and with no exaggeration at all.

My faith is so very important to me and I am convinced that the progress that is already being seen is in no small part down to those prayers and to God’s grace. When all this came about I prayed so very hard about it and determined that I would stand on God’s word and rest in His love over all this and that is what I have tried to do.

As soon as I have more news as to the exact treatment I will post again but until then please forgive me lack of posting, but I am determined to keep my leg elevated as much as possible which means that the time I actually do get to spend at the computer is used for other things such as emails and managing the websites that I manage for folk.

I haven’t been posting very much lately and I apologize for that but I promise you there have been good reasons and not least of them being that I have needed to keep my leg elevated. So sitting at my desk has been difficult and limited.

It is Friday evening and I am so very tired. Sleeping has been so very difficult of late for several different reasons. Even so I am trying to remain positive and to ‘keep on keeping on’ as they say.

Yesterday was my birthday and I really did have a pleasant day. My son and his partner came over and bought me probably one of the most thoughtful presents I have ever received – which I am going to keep secret for the time being but will share about in a later post some time down the line.

I managed to keep my birthday a secret from most folks – which always pleases me – and I also managed to get some personal correspondence written. It has been on my mind to write it for some time now but things kept seeming to get in the way.

In my last post “Days of The Crows” I explained how the voices have been at me of late. I mentioned some of the misunderstandings, falsehoods and the such that have been upsetting me but what I didn’t mention was the underlying environment in which this has all happened. Mostly because I needed to get my head into a place where I could rationally talk about it.

Regular readers will know that I have for some years now suffered from extremely poor health and as a result of this (well mostly as a result of this) have had a constant battle with my weight. The more regular reader will know that I also have a condition in my leg which make it swell up from time to time and then go down and stay relatively down (and relatively normal) at other times.

Over the past few months however I have noticed that it has not been going down and in fact has remained constantly swollen. Over the past 10 days or so not only has the leg been swollen – far more than usual – but the foot on that leg has also become swollen – so much so that even if I can managed to struggle and force my shoe on it I can’t do the thing up.

Additionally the skin in one area at least (I can’t see all of the leg) is starting to break down, which I was warned is the early signs of atrophy and which could very well be the beginning of the end for that leg and might lead to amputation.

I don’t even know how fast that process happens once it has started.

It’s a very scary thought isn’t it?

I mean I try to do all that I can – I have been applying the moisturizer where I can – (not only can I not see all the leg I also can’t reach it all) but whilst the skin damage is still (I hope) in the early stage, it does mean that the breaking down process has begun. Which, trust me, is both very scary and very worrying.

Apart from one or two close friends at church (and I do mean only one or two) an of course my kids/family, I have not been able to speak about this up until now as somehow the more you speak about it the more real it becomes. But over the past day or so I have decided that not speaking about it isn’t fair.

I had promised – when starting this blog – that I would, within reason, be honest and open in my writing and who knows there may be others out there who are going through the same thing.

The good news is (and yes I always try to see the good no matter how bad things appear) that I have an appointment on Monday and will be able to get some expert advice on it and I am hoping and praying (and yes please do pray if you have a faith) that the prognosis will not be as bad as my mind thinks (and the voices say) it is.

The truth is however that I just don’t know an will not know until Monday. But even so, I do have my faith and I do get such strength from that.

And I know that whatever happens He will bring me through this!

I probably won’t be posting much over the weekend but hopefully that is just because I am being sensible. I can post from my iPhone and of course answer comments but if honest I find that difficult and so will probably only answer the occasional comments from there.

But whatever happens I will post on or around Monday and let you know how I got on. Until then remember God is good and I have absolute faith in Him and in His love.

I found this picture over at my-walls.net and it really is appropriate for this post 🙂

Whilst a different location and indeed not a photo I myself have taken it is very similar of a scene that I know so very well. A group (or murder) of crows suddenly flying up out of a field.

Look out of my study window and across the road you will see a field (although not as pretty as the one in the photo) and very often there are crows in that field. They sit, walk, peck and feed on it quite contentedly.

Not many people really know they are there (except the field itself of course) until there is a sudden noise (kids shouting or a car back-firing) and suddenly they all rise up, en-mass, at hover in frantic flight, cawing as they do so!

Like I said, it is a scene that I know so very well! But not only in reality also within my head where my mind is the field and the crows are the voices that I hear.

Voices which not many people know they are there except my mind of course on which they continually sit, walk, peck and feed quite contentedly.

But for these dark hallucinatory birds of vocal accusations and ridicule to take frantic flight en-mass there needs be no sudden loud noise just arguments, unjust criticism, false accusations, illogical misunderstandings.

It started with an innocent comment made by a fellow blogger, then came an accusation made in email and the ensuing discussions where the truth finally came out, followed by yet another understanding and folk assuming and then accusing me of feeling and reacting totally differently to how I actually was.

But these things happen don’t they? Misunderstandings, incorrect assumptions, insensitive behavior? And in truth, whilst we might do all we can to reduce them, we cannot stop them.

Much like the voices – those sinister black crows which take frantic flight and hover and caw for days to follow – these things will happen.

Courtesy of wall321.com no copyright infringement intended. –

Trust me, if I had a gun and the necessary ammunition, I would shoot each and everyone of the voices, those crows – out of my life, my mind.

And yet we do in some ways have that gun and the necessary ammunition don’t we? We have the truth and rational thinking and whilst this may not completely rid us of our crows (the voices) they can reduce them and come against them. (2 Corinthians 10:5)

Courtesy of tn disckerson diaries over at blogspot, no copyright infringement intended.

Of course we don’t all suffer with schizophrenic voices do we? But we do all to some degree or another have internal dialogues going on don’t we? And we all do, generally speaking, have access to the truth and to rational thinking.

So yes it may have been a difficult few days, days of the crows, but I , for one am getting my ammunition and am going to be looking forward to clearer skies 🙂

Yesterday, well early this morning, I wrote a post dealing, in part, with those internal dialogues that so many of us have. The post was called “Encouragements from not a weirdo!” and the title was resultant from those internal dialogues.

But what about those external dialogues? Those messages that we receive from others – especially those closest to us?

Sad aren’t they? But what is even sadder perhaps is just how much you and I can relate to them.

The truth is that some relationships are just toxic aren’t they?

And we need to be very careful about them and about the messages that we take in from such relationships.

Of course not all relationships readily appear to be toxic or harmful and indeed some are so very subtle in how they harm us aren’t they?

Sometimes it is as much about how someone treats us as it is about what they actually say to us, or what kind of activities they lead us into rather than anything spoken or readily identifiable.

I think that is why I like this image (featured left) which I found (here) so much as it reminds me that sometimes folk seem to want to “pull our strings” (so to speak) for their own advantage without us even knowing.

But this just adds to the need to be cautious and to review the relationships that we have and the kind of influences those relationships exert on us, doesn’t it?

One way in which we can keep a check on this is to take an audit of all our relationships and to determine if their communications, their effect on us, their influences and attitudes are positive or negative.

Why not give it a go?

Write down all the names ( on separate scraps of paper) of the people you spend time with and then set two pile markers. One marked “positive” and one marked “negative”.

Take each scrap of paper in turn, look at the name on it and then – objectively and honestly considering their; messages to you, communications with you, treatment of you, place them in the appropriate pile.

(If you are just not sure about someone place them to one side and come back and look at them in more detail.)

You may be surprised by the result!

For those you are not sure about get another piece of paper and consider them in more detail.

It can be an interesting exercise to do and when you have got your two piles think about what needs to change in order to bring those relationships on the negative side to the positive side.

And of course this is not just a one way street!

We also need to consider the messages we give them, our communication with them, how we ourselves treat them.

After all, aren’t we all potentially just as fallible as the next person?

As someone who suffers from poor mental health and yes those voices and internal dialogues that I spoke of earlier and in yesterday’s post, I think this is such an important thing.

And as a Christian I have found it equally important!

Even within my relationships in church and with other believers I have needed to be careful and I believe the bible encourages us to be so.

So even with my relationship in church and with other believers I review and audit those relationships. Do they glorify God, encourage me, inspire me, motivate me?

Are the conversations that they invite me to be a part of positive or negative, do they glorify God, spread love and understanding and wisdom? Do they encourage and build or tear down and destroy?

Likewise, the activities that they are encouraging me to be a part of, are they glorifying to God, draw me closer to God or attempt to pull me or take me away from Him?

i truly believe that this is an important consideration not only in respect of our mental health but also our spiritual health and I look forward to your feedback on it!

Given the time of year and it’s significance to believers the world over I wonder how many of you looked at the title and immediately thought, “Oops Kevin you made a typo in your title in respect of the spelling of ‘Week’.”

Hey, it’s an understandable assumption 🙂 But the truth is that it is not a typo and I deliberately chose to use the word weak and indeed to write this post at this time because it seems so appropriate and is so on my heart right now.

Holy Week in the Christian’s calendar is the time when perhaps more than any other time we remember Christ’s arrest, trial, torture, crucifixion, burial, resurrection and ultimately His ascension.

But if I may, for the purpose of this post, I would like to invite you to reflect with me on just one aspect of that time – that time after Christ was crucified and before he rose again.

I wonder how the disciples felt at that time? How would you have felt if you had been one of the disciples?

You meet a man who claims to be the Son of God and who changes your life in a radical and unmistakable way. You dedicate your life to Him and He rightly becomes the very center, and in many ways, the very focus of your life.

You spend all of your time with Him, eat with Him, talk with Him, travel with Him. You witness and share in His deep love and compassion for people, see Him speak prophesy, heal the sick, give sight to the blind and mobility to the lame. You witness first hand the miracles and wonders that He performs and you believe with all you heart that “truly He IS the Son of God” and “truly the Kingdom of God is upon us!”

And then suddenly He is taken from you!

This ‘Son of God’, this ‘Promised One’, this ‘Messiah’, this ‘Saviour of the World’ was; betrayed by one of your own, arrested, tortured, placed on trial, and then crucified!

“Will He come down off the cross?”, “Will God smite His enemies and rescue Him?”, “Will the heavens open and God Himself speak?”, “Does this sudden darkness mean God is about to act?” These are all understandable questions aren’t they? Realistic expectations?

But no. None of that happens? Instead He dies and is taken away and buried in a tomb.

He is gone!

As suddenly as He came into your life, He is gone from it.

All that is left is a sealed tomb and an empty cross!

All that you are left with are questions and a deep longing in your heart”

How would you feel? What thoughts and questions would flood through your mind? What would you do?

Go to that tomb? Wait for something to happen? Perhaps return to that now empty cross – standing there simply looking at it with so many thoughts, so many questions, so many emotions flowing through your heart and mind?

What now? What comes next? Surely that can’t be it? Surely it doesn’t end here? Surely something else has to come? Surely there must be more? Surely this newness must continue!

Step forward in time with me, if you will, to more recent years. 1985 and a young 23 year old man. A young man who had believed in God all his life and indeed who could never remember a time when he did not believe in God.

And yet somehow that wasn’t enough and he knew it. Somehow knowing there was a God but not having a relationship with God left a void in his heart, an emptiness, a sense of “there must be more to life.”

Then an evangelical mission came to town one preaching on Christ Jesus.

It would spend two weeks in local school and village halls and then 4 weeks in a 4000 seated Circus tent.

Every night there would be a service with praise and worship, a guest artist, a sermon/bible teaching delivered by the evangelist Eric Delve and then an invitation to respond and invite Christ into your life and to have a living relationship with God through Christ and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

I had a lot of time on my hands in those days and so for the first two weeks I was heavily involved as a steward, traveling to all the venues and helping out. Then when it moved into the Circus tent I took on the role of security coordinator.

For four weeks I, along with other volunteers in my team slept, ate, worked and served in that tent and every night we would be part of the ministry and service.

It became my life. The more I heard about this Christ, the more I wanted, needed to know Him and to serve Him. The more involved I was the more involved I wanted and needed to be.

I was letting Him into my heart and giving my life to Him and I knew it, felt it, needed it, lived it.

Finally on the last night of the mission I too responded to the alter call and went forward. I wanted to make that public confession and witness that I too had given my life to the Lord.

And then the mission ended!

The evangelical team, counseling team, worship team, stewarding team, security team – everyone left and returned to their normal lives and to their home churches.

The circus tent came down was packed up and taken away and I returned to my one-roomed apartment and to, well to, to what exactly? What was next?

My life, my heart, my faith had been so full of Christ for those previous six weeks but then the focus of that fullness, the

I remember so clearly going back, a few days later, to the site where the circus tent had been and standing, staring at the huge empty circus of different colored foot-trodden grass where the tent had been.

Just as the disciples could have stood before the site of that empty cross all those years before, there stood I before the empty site of that mission – asking similar questions – searching for similar answers…

“What now? What comes next? Surely that can’t be it? Surely it doesn’t end here? Surely something else has to come? Surely there must be more? Surely this newness must continue!”

In truth I a have spoken about two very real and very specific episodes of doubt and of questioning. Understandable doubt and understandable questioning – one in the life of the disciples and one in my own personal life.

But of course many of us face times of doubt don’t we? Times of question? Times when perhaps the faith that we once had does not seem so real so vital as once it did?

And my personal experience is that for many of us who face challenges and difficulties with our mental health, times of doubt and questions and indeed times when the troubles of life seem to become overwhelming and get in the way of our faith are quiet frequent and normal. But doe that make us weak? Does that mean we are not Holy?

Indeed is there, can there, be such a thing as the Holy Weak?

Well I for one am convinced that there can and are those who are both Holy and who experience times of spiritual weakness.

Romans 8:26 – 26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. (NIV)

Matthew 5:3 – “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. (NIV)

Yes I am convinced that there are those who do experience times of spiritual weakness for whom Holiness is still a part of their lives or can still be part of their lives. And what is more I am convinced that that Holiness is not taken from up when we face times of weakness but instead is afforded to us in greater measure when we face those times of weakness by calling on the name of the Lord and giving it to God in prayer.

Earlier, in what I now freely admit has become a fairly lengthy post, I shared about the first time when that spiritual weakness was faced by me. Shortly after I came to know Christ in fact. But there have been many other time when I have faced such weaknesses, such times of trouble and trial – such times of doubting and questioning.

And I am sure that there are others for whom that is also true – especially within the mental health community – and sadly often as a result of the way others within the body of Christ have treated us.

But I want to encourage you – you who, like me consider yourself at times to be part of the Holy weak and especially at this time – this Holy week.

“I will not leave you as orphans…” (John 14:18 NIV). These are the words Christ Himself spoke to the disciples when He was telling them of His having to leave and when He was (unbeknown to them) talking about that arrest, torture, trial, crucifixion, burial, resurrection and ascension that we spoke of earlier and which is so prominent in our hearts and minds at this time of year.

No matter how weak we may feel, no matter how un-holy our lives may have become, no matter how hurt or down-trodden we believe ourselves to be, I am convinced that God does not want us to either feel as orphans, live as orphans or be orphans.

Christ promised – in that same conversation with His disciples – the indwelling of the Holy Spirit for His disciples – for the believers. That same promise is, I am convinced and have personally experienced, available to each and every one of us who have made that commitment to Christ.

So the question I ask you is – do you feel orphaned? Are you living as an orphan? Have you let the hurts and troubles of life and any personal spiritual weakness that you have felt rob you of knowing the fullness of God’s love through that relationship with Christ by the power of the Holy Spirit?

Because if you have, I am convinced and certain that this is not what God – our heavenly Father desires for you.

Sometimes in life we come across folk who seem to react instantly and badly to things that happen or that they think have happened. Don’t we?

You know, those who seem to throw their toys out of the pram the minute something goes – or seems to go – wrong.

And the fact is that we have probably all, or at least most of us, done this at some time or other in life.

And in truth it is a behavior which we see in most toddlers.

Won’t they (and we when we were younger), at one point or another have done this – thrown their toys out of the pram?

When it first happens most parents will; bend down pick up the toy, brush it off/clean it, and give it back to the toddler concerned.

Sometimes, of course, the toddler sees this as a being fun. So naturally they throw it out again, and often the parent will repeat the whole returning process.

But of course with human nature being what it is, the more this happens the more rewarding it becomes for the child and equally the more frustrating it becomes for the parent.

So the process reaches a point where the parent cottons on to the fact that it has become a game and so – not wishing to reward the child or encourage it and allow it to become a learned behavior – they simply warn the child (if the child is old enough to understand) or simply refrains from returning the toy to the child.

It is, I think we would all agree, a perfectly natural and common place event in childhood and parenting is it not?

But what happens when it isn’t a child involved? What happens when it is an adult and not toys out of a pram but people out of a relationship? And what happens when the learned behavior is already their and that person – being discarded – is YOU?

I am, I think, many things to many people. Different people see me in different ways and that again is, I think very natural. To some I come across as very approachable and very caring. To others – or so it seems – I come across as detached and uncaring. To some the practical joker and yet others a very serious, deep thinker.

Actually, I can even remember one time when I was standing next to a lady in church – whom I had known casually for some months but never ever really had a cross word with or any long or noteworthy conversation with – when she turned to me and said, “I have to tell you Kevin, you really scare me. I just find you so intimidating.”

I have to admit that I was both stunned and somewhat surprised by the revelation and how it seemed to come out of absolutely nowhere.

I also have to admit that I was very saddened by that revelation. After all, it isn’t as if I am some sort of Ogre 🙂

Now don’t get me wrong, I understand that I am a big guy. Actually a very big guy and I accept that my size can make me a little intimidating.

I also understand that the way my mind works I am often deep in thought and do on occasion – either as a result of my schizo-affective disorder or my Aspergers – sometimes respond more deeply (or conversely say simply things) which others would perhaps hold back on.

But none of these are intended to push people away or intimidate. And neither of them demonstrate how deeply I do care about people.

Actually, I personally think that it is something that people often get very wrong about folk who experience mental health struggles and especially those of us who have Aspergers. They somehow think that we just don’t care or do not have emotions on the same level that they do.

The truth is of course, – or at least in my experience the truth is – that they are very wrong and we do care – sometimes more deeply than others may – we just demonstrate it and process it in different ways.

So when something happens and someone gets upset and throw’s YOU out of their pram, closing the door to you and ceasing all communication it can be very hurtful.

Not least of all because it means that you can no longer show them the love that you have to offer and which in a lot of cases they actually need.

It is of course quite natural to say, “Well good luck to you then. If you don’t need me or my love then who cares?” But the fact is that deep down inside, perhaps under the initial hurt, we do still care don’t we?

And to accept anything else, to stop loving that person, to allow our focus to be on any hurt, to allow those hurt to become bitterness and to fester is unhealthy for them, for us and as Christians to our faith.

No, I am convinced that the truth is that when this happens our loving them doesn’t have to stop. The only thing that stops is their ability to see and fully know how much we love them perhaps.

So instead this is when our love, which by now admittedly probably has a greater cost to us as we need to surrender those hurts, needs to take a different form and to be offered solely in prayer.

And whilst it is true that prayer should have formed part of our love for them all along, it is in the surrendering of those hurts – in the heartfelt love and caring for the person who has caused us that hurt by rejecting us – which will also guard our heart against bitterness.

And that in turn allows our doors to remain open for when they have calmed down or seen things differently – perhaps more clearly. And in so doing – to allow for the healing that needs to take place.

Why am I blogging about this now? Well because a couple of days ago this happened to me. A misunderstanding caused someone, someone I have known but a few days and yet already care so very deeply for, to throw me out of their life and to close the door on my love.

Did it hurt? Yes very much so. But as I have said, it is at times like this when our love must take a different form. Why? Because that is what love is and that is what I know God would want for and from us.

…casteth out fear.

There are a number of passages in the Bible which make me sit up and question, sit up an reflect on, their true meaning.

Indeed there are a number of passages that lead me off on wonderful journeys of discovery.

Likewise some passages which I thought I had understood will often leap out at me with new meaning, new significance, new revelation.

But then, more than any other writing, the Bible for me stands unique as a constant living and fluid unfurling of narration, a living explanation of the relationship that I have with God through Christ.

One such passage that has often caused me to sit and reflect is that of 1 John 4:18…

18 There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. (KJV)

“But perfect love casteth out fear.” Its an interesting one isn’t it? Especially if, like me paranoia, or anxiety, forms part of your mental health. And especially if thqt paranoia forms part of your schizophrenia or your schizo-affective disorder and those ‘voices’ or that inner dialogue asks such things as “see you have fear, so you are not made perfect in love – what does that tell you then?”

The key words for me here however, is that of “casteth out” or in the NIV ” drives out”. In the Greek the word is βάλλω (ballō) and means to throw out or get rid of. So in answer to those voices and that inner dialogue I have to say, “how can you cast out, drive out, throw out, or get rid of something that you don’t have?”

It is a valid point isn’t it? You have to have something in the first place in order to be able to cast it out or get rid of it? So having a faith in God through Christ doesn’t mean that I will never fear or have reason to fear, it instead challenges what I do with fear when it comes my way.

So let’s look at that for a moment…

I wonder how many of us as parents have had our child or children wake up from a bad dream or nightmare and in their fear automatically call out to us of come to our bedroom door in search of us?

Or if you have no children how many of us can remember doing that ourselves when we were children and had a bad dream or nightmare?

Just going to Mum or Dad and getting their reassurance and the security that that offered dealt with that fear didn’t it? The faith and trust that perfect love that a child has for and in and from his or her parents casts out that fear.

Isn’t (and shouldn’t) the same be true in respect of the fear that we face in life as children of God?

Can’t we go to Him in faith through Christ knowing that as our perfect heavenly Father we have that perfect blessed assurance?

God is our heavenly Father and His love is perfect. In Him we have comfort and joy, as the old song goes, and yet there is no where in the Bible – as far as I can see – that says that through a relationship with God through Christ all threats, all trials, all troubles will be removed from us. In fact there are several places that indicate that they may well increase.

I have long since said, that one of the fundamental roles of a parent for a child is in many ways to be representatives and representations of God until the child is able to understand and develop his or her own relationship with God through Christ Jesus.

That source or comfort, of reassurance, of guidance and protection that we should get from our parents – especially in our younger years – is an excellent example of this and I fully believe that as Christians it is the perfect love of our heavenly Father that enables us to cast out all fear.

Some students of the bible will no doubt suggest that since this verse being preceded by the words of verse 17…

17 This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus.

it would indicate that this passage is speaking of the day of judgement, but I would point out that actually it is also about how we live our lives up to that day. Consider the words of verse 19 I would add…

19 We love because he first loved us.

We love because He first loved us and it is that perfect love that provides is with the courage that we need to run the race for which we are called.

Yes things have and in many ways are still tough and I know that I am not alone in that and that many others are going through equally if not tougher times. But as a child of my heavenly Father, His perfect love gives me the strength to go on 🙂

Well it has been a long time since I have done a serious post. Certainly much longer than I had anticipated or would have wanted.

In my post “A. W. O. L.” (posted March 4th) I briefly explained how I had not been well for some time and how due to this (and the cold weather) I had not felt able to post anything coherent or noteworthy.

I also thanked everyone for their very kind concern and messages of encouragement and “well-wishes” and would very much to thank everyone again now.

The good news is that I am very much on the mend now and have been busy working away on a couple of projects that I have been wanting to do for a while now.

The truth is that I had found myself in a bit of a hole, quite a deep hole really – and I would wager I am not alone in experiencing these.

I knew that I was in one and indeed could see the light at the end of the tunnel and hope that I would soon reach the end of it, but actually reaching it was something entirely different!

Mentally I have been struggling also. Thankfully not so much that I couldn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. Isn’t that often what depression can be like? That no matter whether the light is there sometimes we just can’t see it?

Physically I have also been struggling and sometimes, no matter how bright the light or how desperately I may have wanted to get to it, I just haven’t had the strength of means to reach it. So it was as if the light at the end of the tunnel seemed unreachable for that time.

Thankfully I was not alone in all of this. I had the kindness of many of you and the support and care and encouragement of my family and friends and my church family and even more I had (and have) my faith to help me get through it all.

So I am very encouraged!

Not only do I feel much stronger but now I even feel as if I am climbing out of that hole that I was in and I am looking forward to getting back into the swing of things! (Of course I have to exercise wisdom and caution and ease back into things)

As I said before, I am so thankful for all the care and support that I have had and for all your kindness. I am also extremely thankful for my faith which has without doubt helped me through this last episode 🙂

I mean it is something that the majority of us actually want, if we are truly honest with ourselves and something that we seek in life. To be accepted by our family, our work colleagues, our neighbors and friends.

It is also something which a lot of us, including those of us with mental health challenges, truly struggle with isn’t it? To be accepted for who we are – even with our illnesses.

It hurts and unnerves us or unsettles us, even angers us when we are not accepted. It seems harsh and uncaring, unjust and unfair when we are not accepted and can lead to a whole plethora of questions and soul-searching. And let’s be honest here, it can be emotionally crippling when it happens can’t it.

“I mean after all, what is so wrong with me, what is so bad about me, what is it that I have done, that they don’t like me, won’t accept me?”

Do they sound like familiar questions, a familiar thought process to you?

Or perhaps you have reached a stage or place in life where you have asked these questions so often now, where those thought processes have been so present in your life that you have simply stopped asking them, simply stopped questioning?

Or perhaps your past experiences – your childhood or past relationships – were such where any self-worth that you may have had was crushed or taken from you? Or perhaps worse still where you were never given any self-worth in the first place?

And where this happens what does it do to us and how we view ourselves? And as a result of that what does it do to what we are willing to accept in life?

This question has been on my heart of late and I can’t help wondering how many of us are accepting what we think we deserve (as a result of the poor self-worth or self-image that we have formulated as a result of those bad relationship or lack of positive affirmation in the past) instead of fighting for what we need?

If our child was ill and needed medical treatment we would do all we could to get them the best treatment possible wouldn’t we? Likewise for a parent were they to need medical treatment or for a loved one. So why are we not applying the same standards of expectations when it comes to ourselves?

Destroying the internal dialogues of the past and changing the way that they affect us is not easy is it?

As someone who experiences poor mental health I think this is one of my biggest battles. Add as a mental health advocate it is also a battle all too often present when folk share with me the things that are affecting them.

As a Christian – even one with poor mental health – I am convinced this is not how it is meant to be. Not what God desires for us. I am convinced that I, that we, need to combat these internal dialogues and thoughts, and I am reminded of some of the words Paul writes in his admonishment to the church at Corinth (2 Corinthians 10:3-5 NIV)…

3 For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. 4 The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. 5 We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.

I am convinced that God loves us and wants the best for us just as any good parent would want for his or her child.

So that is my new challenge to myself and one I invite you to consider. “to take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.”

It opens with the statement “Written by the Rev Eva McIntyre on behalf of the Church’s Archbishops’ Council and the Time to Change mental health campaign, it suggests John the Baptist, St Paul, St Francis and other figures from the Bible may all have been mentally ill.” which is then followed by a paragraph reading… “It even asks followers to consider accusations made in the New Testament that Jesus “had lost his mind”.”

Putting aside the whole issue of churches assigning “sainthood” on certain people – which I find erroneous and misleading – and the fact that, from what research I have been able to do, the Express appears to have completely misshaped and misrepresented the original piece written by the Rev McIntyre – gee now there’s a shock!

But even so there are some interesting points to be raised as a result of this article and I can understand the problems folk are having as a result of this piece.

As a Christian I have for some time now been very much aware of the difficulty that can be had reconciling the understanding that Jesus Christ was fully man and yet fully God. Likewise I can certainly understand how the mere suggestion that Jesus may have had mental health problems could seem offensive to some and difficult to comprehend for others.

As a Christian who suffers with mental health problems myself, I find that my mind is drawn to the question – “So what if He did, does that make Him any less the Messiah or any less Holy or indeed any the less worthy to be used by God?”

And there within lies one of the difficulties with this whole issue does it not? The extremely fragile counterbalance between Christ’s deity and his humanness appears extremely impacted by anything which appears to emphasize or increase his humanness.

And yet there is another consideration that arises from this article, one which speaks directly into and challenges not Christ and His human qualities verses His Godly qualities in respect of any mental health, but with we believers and our human qualities versus our Christlike qualities in respect of mental health.

It calls into question our own individual and Church attitudes as believers, to the whole issue of mental illness, poor mental health and those who suffer from them. But then is that not the whole point?

The Revd Eva McIntyre makes the statement that “Many of the people we read about in Bible stories might today be considered as having mental health issues.” and asks “Would Jesus’ family maybe on occasion have said, “Cousin John is a bit odd, bless him!” when John the Baptist took to his eccentric style of life?”

And I for one can see some validity in this point, but would have to make the observation that just because someone’s actions do not fit within the ‘norm’ it doesn’t mean that they are suffering from mental health issues. And I would make the point that the very fact that these biblical characters were being used by God for supernatural purposes indeed places them outside of the ‘norm’.

But it is an interesting point isn’t it?

If indeed “many of the people we read about in the bible” did have what we today would consider to be mental health problems and God still used them, what does that say for the way we believers and especially the church currently responds to folk who do have mental health problems today?

See here’s the deal as far as I see it. We simply don’t know if those biblical characters of old did have mental health problems or not. And the truth is that, as far as I can see, there is not enough real evidence to support any suggestion of such beyond the realms of it being pure conjecture.

So the question then becomes an “IF” based question. “IF” they did have mental health problems and yet were still, as we know from the bible, used by God, then why are so many folk who do experience poor mental health today seemingly either too frightened to admit it within a church setting or, as seems all too often to be the case, being hurt and driven away from our churches when they do admit it?

And having asked that question I do feel the need, in the interest of openness and fairness to make a personal statement here.

I personally am very open about my mental health and have not to my knowledge at any time experienced anything other then love, understanding and acceptance from the leadership of the church that I currently attend. Likewise in terms of it’s members I have received similar love, understanding and acceptance apart from in one or two instances where opinions where questions about my mental health were asked in clumsy ways. But I would expect that from any group and after all we are all human and do all make mistakes.

Similarly in my previous fellowship where I was far more involved and was also involved in leadership, my mental health was not seen as any great obstacle and I was again met with love and understanding and acceptance in most things.

That having been said, sadly the same isn’t always true for everyone and there is without doubt a very real need for the kind of questions raised by this article as a result of Revd Eva McIntyre’s piece to be asked by each and everyone of and by our churches and fellowships.

I have to be honest here, whilst the headline of the article and indeed some of it’s content appears, to this writer, to have been manipulated for dramatic effect, there are some interesting points made in it and some interesting questions asked.

And let’s face it, it is high time that all churches prayerfully considered they way they respond to the whole question of mental health.

Does my mental health challenge my faith? Yes absolutely, and yes absolutely it challenges it in ways that lots of folk simply can’t understand. BUT the truth is that all of our walks are to some degree or another unique and we all face individual challenges and more than that, so much more than that, my faith also challenges my mental health and provides me with such a richness of security and strength in the face of that mental health and I for one praise God for that!

…and Surviving The Attacks!

Well it has been days since my last post. The truth is that I have been really struggling mentally of late. I haven’t even been able to get to Church or Bible study lately and I can’t begin to tell you how much this has been affecting my mental health.

I am incredibly mindful at this time, having read some of the blogs that I usually follow, that actually this is quite a minor thing compared to what others seem to be going through at the moment, and yet, as minor as it is, it is a huge thing to me.

But then that is often how poor mental health works isn’t it? Things that others may view as being small, insignificant or unimportant are so very important to us personally and certainly I try to remember that when reading other folk’s blogs.

That it isn’t how I would or do respond to such situations as they are going through but how they respond to them and I try to love and pray through that perspective.

In fact my mental health seems to be pivoting on a knife’s edge at the moment and I am struggling to keep myself stable. That is not to say that I do not know which way to lean if I sense myself staring to fall.

It is at times like these when I like to, need to, take stock. To look at what I have still been able to achieve and to build on those things whilst cautiously, carefully addressing the things that I still need to achieve.

There is little doubt that there are things that need attending to but the question is how to attend to them…

Prayerfully building on that which I have already been able to achieve is certainly a good place to start. But at the same time being realistic about what I still have to do.

Additionally I need to be mindful of what I am “able” for in my current state of mind, whilst at the same time being mindful of anything that needs my attention now.

This is so that it does not become a major headache or issue within the next few days thus negatively effecting my current delicate mental state.

Being open and honest with others when you are in this kind of mental state can be so very difficult can’t it? But then being open and honest with yourself can be equally as difficult.

But that openness and honesty is, in my opinion, the doorway to getting the help that you need at times like this. That is providing of course that such help is available to you and you know how to access it.

I entitled this post “Standing Firm In The Struggles…”…And Surviving The Attacks!” and I did that for a reason.

I have often written of how, in my experience and opinion, our emotional, mental, physical and spiritual health all interact with each other in respect of our well-being.

As a Christian I have long-since learned that my help comes from the Lord, and He has to be the very first port of call at times such as these.

But as a Christian I am not an isolated or solitary person and nor am I meant to be. I am member of Christ’s family and that help should also come through my brothers and sisters in Christ. I have little to no doubt that my not having been able to get to church lately has affected my mental health and I have little doubt that my current mental state is – to some degree or another – part of an attack.

So I stand on the encouragements to be found in the full armor of God as described in Ephesians 6 and I remember especially the words of Ephesians 6:13

Well yesterday I determined to combat the scattiness of my brain at the moment and get some things achieved regardless.

I prayed, chilled and wrote a to do list and then got on with it.

To be honest I had hoped, well a small part of me had hoped, that by doing so my brain would support me in this effort and kick start into gear.

Well that isn’t quite what happened although I still managed to complete some of the things that were on my to do list. 🙂

On writing my list I knew that I would not get it all completed in one day and had provided for the possibility that some of the things that I wanted to achieve I would have to do today and even tomorrow if needs be.

What was one of the attitudes I determined to have when writing my to do list? Oh yes, “Be kind to yourself – Don’t create too many expectations and allow for and tolerate any mistakes.”

I am so glad that I decided to do that as I really didn’t get as much completed as I had hoped. But then life, as I mentioned yesterday, does sometimes throw a curve ball our way and a couple of people needed my help and that reduced the time I had to do the things I had planned to do. And additionally I had not considered or remembered the fact that I am only just getting over my latest bout of illness and so am still not totally fit.

The good news is not only have I been able to achieve some of the things I wanted to do but I also have a good idea of what I want to achieve today also.

So my to do list is now revised and updated and I am all set to carry on from yesterday 🙂

I have, several times in fact, heard of depression being referred to as the ‘black dog’.

I have to be honest here and say that I really don’t like that label or the picture that it represents.

Yes I know that black is a color often understandably linked to depression and yes I know that dogs sometimes follow you around and get under your feet. But I just find the picture contradictory as a dog (of any color) is meant to be man’s best friend and actually I really like dogs. Whereas I really don;t like depression lol.

No, when it comes to my depression, I just can’t bring myself to think of it, or refer to it as ‘the black dog’.

Now a gathering of crows however, well now that is an entirely different story and a terms which I am more than willing to link to or use in reference to my depression.

I personally have a long and sinister link to crows. One featured very heavily in my childhood. Additionally they have long since been linked to sinister dark things and to cap it all off, the technical term for a gathering or group of crows is a ‘murder’. And if anything can murder happiness depression can. So yes crows are much more suitable as a picture of depression in my opinion.

So why am I telling you all this? Well because those darned crows have been a gathering i my life recently and I didn’t even realize it until a couple o days ago.

Regular readers and followers of this blog will know that I haven’t been posting of late and will know that this is because my health took a turn for the worst again.

Actually it started before Christmas and got progressively worse since then. I contracted some sort of flu like virus and it really knocked be for six! And no matter what I did I couldn’t shake it. Additionally, it aggravated my heart condition and fatigue took hold and stayed with me for weeks. All of which I was perfectly aware of and (as I thought) fairly used to as these things happen frequently in my life as a result of my general health.

What I hadn’t realized, however, was just how this was affecting me mentally and spiritually. Without knowing it I started losing my joy and my hope and this in itself was simply adding to and complicating my response to my physical illnesses.

I started losing my resilience and my ‘fight’ as more and more crows gathered (metaphorically speaking).

Actually it wasn’t until one of my adopted parents mentioned that they wondered if I had become more and more depressed as a result of this latest bout of illness, and I had listened to a recorded sermon from one of my pastors ( I couldn’t make church and was uploading the sermon to the church website anyway so I thought I would listen to it) that I realized just what was happening.

Depression is such a complex thing and I really do understand the genetic and neurochemical factors involved in some, including my own. depression. But the presence of genetic and/or nuerochemical factors does not automatically exclude the presence of additional circumstantial or environmental or emotional or psychological or spiritual factors.

I am convinced that regardless of the presence of genetic and/or nuerochemical factors we need to do all that we can to have a positive and healthy attitude of mind and of heart if we are to beat this thing. And that is a lesson I am constantly having to relearn or remember it seems.

Thankfully my physical health appears to be on the mend, at least to the point it was prior to this latest bout of illness and whilst I am still very fatigued I am getting stronger each day!

I am so grateful for this and I am so very grateful that I have people in my life who will bring positive messages and encouragements to me. I am also very thankful for all the prayers that folk have been praying on my behalf.

Hopefully I will be back posting as normal within a few days but I did want to post this update to everyone and to thank everyone for their love, concern, encouragement and prayers.

Each and every expression of love, each and every word of encouragement, each and every demonstration of concern, each an every prayer offered on my behalf has been an active and definite weapon against that gathering of crows that I mentioned.

And for this I am extremely thankful and I praise God for each an every one of you who have been a part of it.

Day Six –“The Support Group” If you could start a support group specific to your mental illness what would it do, what activities, what purpose etc and what would you call it?

I think if I were to start a support group, which I probably wouldn’t do in person for reasons of my ill-health and lack of mobility, it would be on the internet and in some ways this is what the Mental Health Writer’s Guild is all about.

But there are other blogs that I have started which are also intended to be of a support group nature and I find that I struggle with these.

I started this blog as the subject is such an important issue for me and yet I truly struggle in keeping this blog going and feel that I am failing somehow with it.

I sometimes write things for this site and then think no it is to graphic and so don’t publish them. I am at a bit of a loss with it. My heart says it is needed and will take off but my head says, close it down and don’t give yourself the grief.

Another blog/site that I run – also for the purpose of offering support and information is Christian Concern For Mental Health. Its purpose is several-fold but includes the support and encouragement for Christians who suffer from poor mental health or from mental illness.

It is still in the early stage and I am praying over the direction for both this one and for “Resonate Freedom.” But support will, I am convinced, be a big part of each of them.

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I will, where possible, display this sign at the start of any post where I consider the subject matter to be of a sensitive nature and such that could cause possible distress to others.

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